Object and Animation Basics - Blender Foundations: The Essential Guide to Learning Blender 2.6 - page 44

timeline, but also in parentheses in the
lower left corner of the 3D view. Let's
advance the timeline a bit, change
Suzanne's location and rotation, and add
a new key.

You could LMB click somewhere in the
timeline to change the current frame, but
you should learn a few more hotkeys for
efficient navigation. When animating,
you change the current frame all the time ,
and if you're always heading back to the
timeline, you're going to become sadly
inefficient. Your keyboard's arrow keys
control time.

Figure 3.18 The arrows keys are the masters of time itself.

Figure 3.18 is a diagram of the arrow keys and how they affect the current frame. Right and left arrow
move the frame count by one. Up and down move it by ten.

With that in mind, let's jump ahead 20 frames. Tap the ↑ key twice. You'll notice the frame counter on
the timeline pop ahead each time. You're now on frame 21.

Use the G key to move Suzanne more or less straight down on the screen. Then, rotate her 90 degrees
clockwise so that her head is facing to the right. Use the I key and set another LocRot key.

Go another 20 frames forward (↑ twice), move Suzanne to the right, and rotate her again so her head is
facing upward. Set another LocRot keyframe with the I key.

Finally, do the same thing again (advance 20 frames), move her up, set a final key.

When you've done this, the indicator should be on frame 61, and you should see three yellow lines in
the timeline, one each on frames 1, 21, and 41. These yellow lines indicate that there are keys on those
frames.

Ostensibly, you've just done your first animation. Let's set things up so you can play it back.

In the Timeline view, note the Start and End controls. These indicate the frame range that Blender will
use when playing back (or rendering) animation. Leave the Start value at 1 , and change the End value
to 61 . This encompasses the entire range of work you've just done.

Hover the mouse over the 3D view and activate animation playback with Alt-A . You can also use the
“Play” button (the forward-facing arrow) in the Timeline view header.

The Web Bucket for this chapter contains an animation file of this exercise ( (first_animation.mpeg). ). Compare
it to your own.

A couple of notes on animation playback in the 3D view are necessary. Blender's animation playback
is independent of most other functions. You can start animation playback with Alt-A, then fiddle with